Angelo State Former Football Player Stars in Award-Winning Feature Film

Nolan Osmanski, a former Angelo State University football player and current ASU nursing student. (Contributed/Angelo State)

By Joe Hyde | Feb. 14, 2019 11:21 am

SAN ANGELO, TX — Nolan Osmanski, a former Angelo State University football player and current ASU nursing student, will make his professional acting debut in the award-winning independent feature film, “The Iron Orchard,” on Friday, Feb. 22, when the movie premieres in select theatres around Texas.

Filmed mainly in the Big Spring area, “The Iron Orchard” is the story of Jim McNeely, a young man thrust into the vibrant and brutal West Texas oilfields in 1939, who works his way through the ranks to ultimately become a formidable wildcatter. McNeely is portrayed by Lane Garrison, who has previously appeared in such movies as “Shooter” and “Camp X-Ray” and such TV shows as “NCIS,” “Better Call Saul,” “The Messengers” and “Major Crimes,” among others.

Osmanski’s character is an oilfield worker named Buster Drum and is featured mainly in the first third of the movie, which shows McNeely’s hard early years in the oilfields. Standing 6-4 and 310 pounds, Osmanski said his character’s major role is to bully McNeely and show him just how rough working in the oilfields can be. More details on the entire cast are available on the movie’s IMDb.com page. The official movie trailer is available on YouTube.

A San Angelo native, Osmanski played football for the Rams from 2012-16 and graduated with his bachelor’s degree in natural resource management. He was chosen for his part in the movie after the producers picked him out from photos of “big ol’ nasty offensive linemen” on the ASU athletics website, and he has since become a member of the Screen Actors Guild.

Osmanski is also part of a family tradition at ASU. His older brother, Austin, earned his ASU bachelor’s (2012) and master’s (2014) degrees in biology, and is currently working on his Ph.D. at Texas Tech University. Their father, Paul, is on the ASU nursing faculty, and their mother, Lori, is an ASU nursing graduate.

With a limited release date of Feb. 22, “The Iron Orchard” will premiere at theaters in Big Spring, Midland, Odessa, Lubbock, Grapevine, Plano, Dallas and Fort Worth. On March 1, it will be released at theaters in Los Angeles and New York, as well as in Abilene, Amarillo, Arlington, Austin, Bryan, Burleson, Corpus Christi, Edinburg, El Paso, Frisco, Houston, Lake Jackson, Longview, McAllen, San Antonio, Stafford, Temple, Tyler, Waco and Wichita Falls.

“The Iron Orchard” has already been featured and nominated for more than a dozen awards at numerous film festivals in Texas, Italy, Poland and Spain. So far it has won the following:

Audience Award – 2018 Austin Film Festival

Festival Prize, “Best of Fest” – 2018 Lone Star Film Festival

Special Jury Prize (2) – 2018 Dallas International Film Festival

According to management at the San Angelo Cinemark Theater, “The Iron Orchard” may be selected for local screenings if it does well enough in its initial limited release.